Seattle’s Bird to play despite injured nose

All-Star point guard Sue Bird is expected to play while wearing a mask to protect her injured nose tonight when the Seattle Storm meets the Los Angeles Sparks in the third and deciding game of their first-round WNBA playoff series.

Bird, who averaged 11.4 points and 4.8 assists during the regular season, was hit in the nose by an inadvertent elbow in the final minute Sunday and left the Staples Center court with her bloody face in a towel.

Bird was examined Monday by an ear, nose and throat specialist in nearby Manhattan Beach, according to Jennifer Carroll, the public relations manager for the Storm, who called the injury a contusion.

The Sparks won Sunday 78-70 after losing the opener in the best-of-three series 84-72 Friday night in Seattle.

•Connecticut Sun guard Katie Douglas has a hairline fracture in her right foot and is doubtful for the remainder of the WNBA playoffs.

Douglas was injured in the final minute of the Sun’s first-round, series-winning victory Sunday against Washington.

Track and field

Jones breaks silence

Marion Jones broke her silence on her positive drug test, saying she was shocked and wants the second sample examined quickly.

The five-time Olympic medalist and four-time world champion released a statement through her new attorney, Howard Jacobs, who has represented many athletes in doping cases, including Jones’ former boyfriend Tim Montgomery, the father of her child.

•Sprinter Mark Lewis-Francis won an appeal of his Olympic ban and will be able to compete again for Britain despite a failed doping test last year.

•The Boston Marathon is breaking with age-old tradition and moving up its start time by two hours. The change was announced by the Boston Athletic Association, the race organizer, in an attempt to ease traffic in the eight cities and towns along the course.

•Jamie Astaphan, the doctor who gave Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson the steroids that cost him an Olympic gold medal, has died. He was 60.

Miscellany

Robbins gets probation

Former NFL lineman Barret Robbins was placed on probation and ordered to continue treatment for bipolar disorder under a plea agreement resulting from a brawl with police who shot him.

Robbins, 32, got five years’ probation under the agreement approved last week by Miami-Dade County Circuit Judge Leon Firtel.

•Martina Navratilova won her 175th WTA doubles title when she and Nadia Petrova downed Cara Black and Anna-Lena Groenefeld 6-1, 6-2 at the $1.34 million Rogers Cup in Montreal.

Navratilova is to retire for a second time after the Aug. 28-Sept. 10 U.S. Open in New York.

•American teenagers Chip Peterson and Chloe Sutton won the 10-kilometer open water swimming competition at the Pan Pacific Championships in Victoria, B.C.